


Winter Apples

by Angie (Angie13)



Category: Disney Princesses
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2006-12-25
Updated: 2006-12-25
Packaged: 2018-01-25 08:15:56
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 770
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1640909
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Angie13/pseuds/Angie
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Belle usually has mixed feelings about Snow White's visits.  Stocking Stuffer!</p>
            </blockquote>





	Winter Apples

**Author's Note:**

> Sneaky, sneaky, aren't I?
> 
> Written for Tami

 

 

"Belle?"

"Hmm?" Dark head rising from her book, Belle looked over at her companion. She frowned a bit when the other woman said nothing more, merely stood and stared into the flickering fire, her hands folded demurely atop the yellow silk of her skirt. An embroidery hoop lay abandoned on the spindly little table at her elbow. Sighing, Belle set her book down firmly in her lap, finger marking her place. "Snow," she began in what she hoped was her most patient, understanding tones, "I wish you would finish your sentences. Especially as I was just getting to a really interesting part."

"Oh." The other woman's head lowered, eyes dropping, and she knit and un-knit her fingers as if the act would direct her. "I'm sorry. Never mind then. I didn't mean to be a..."

"If you say `bother,' I'm going to come over there and thump you. Just on principle."

"I'm..." The apology cut off and Snow White looked up with a suddenly lopsided smile. Belle felt her impatience melt away like butter in her mouth. It was terribly unfair of her to be so completely adorable when the time to give her a rough shake arrived. More a girl than a woman, Snow gave new meaning to the word naïve. "I don't mean..." She stopped again, color rising to her cheeks. The sheepish blush always made Belle think of mouth-watering apples, something she never ever would have told her friend. Snow White's phobia of apples overrode any kind of common sense. Honestly, one didn't see Belle avoiding roses and she figured she had as much a right as the other princess.

Shaking her head, Belle felt about for her bookmark and set the closed book on the nearest table. Then she stood and moved towards the fire. She held her hands out as if to warm them but regarded Snow White out the corner of her eye. "You know," she began, light and conversational, "I rather like it when you visit. Things change around here. The drafty old place feels a bit more cozy." She chafed her bare fingers against each other briskly and then held them out once more. "I suppose it's the embroidery," she speculated. "I never could get the hang of that sort of thing. I'm more clever with my mind than my fingers, I'm afraid. I'd be all over..."

"Did you ever feel like the man you married isn't the man you, well... Married?"

Belle froze, hands outstretched. It wasn't at all that Snow White had spoken stridently. If anything, the other woman's voice faded away into the shifting shadows. It had about as much weight as the softly falling snow on the windowsill. It was more the implication of the words that shook the room from its foundations.

Slowly, Belle lowered her hands and turned. She studied the down-turned face presented, flushed cheeks and a twisted little mouth. Too-dark hair and too-pale skin and the tint of rising blood to throw it all into aesthetic idealism. Snow White's hands were again performing their rapid knot-unknot dance. She hesitated, unsure of which direction this conversation was to go. Oh, she knew how she -wanted- it to go. But what she wanted could very well be worlds away from what Snow White wanted. One wrong word and off the other girl would go like a startled deer. Finally, she reached up to chuck her friend under the chin. "Snow, darling, I know I'm not married to the man I married," she replied lightly. She rather hoped the pain in her statement didn't show.

It must have, though, because Snow White lifted her face and her eyes shone as she brought her hands up to clutch at Belle's. "So then..." She sighed. "I almost wish I was alone in it," she whispered. She paused and then, even more quietly, asked, "Does he mistreat you?"

"Oh, no. Heavens, no." Belle smiled. "I'm still fond of him and I do still love him. In our own way. We usually get on like nothing else. But..." She shrugged, turning her head to look into the fire again. "He's no longer my Beast."

"... And he's no longer my Prince Charming."

Belle looked back, surprised, and then surprise became entirely too mild a word as shivering lips pressed against hers and slim white arms wrapped around her neck. Ah, so that was the way of it. Even as her own arms wound around a tiny waist and her own mouth pursued the kiss, Belle's final, fading thoughts were of winter apples, sweet and tart, and the smell of smoky animal fur.

 


End file.
